"Who are you going to see there?"

"Nobody you know, Gas-bag! I never heard of such curiosity!"

"Ah, but I like to think about you when you are away, and know just
where you are and what you are doing every minute of the time."

At which he laughed and kissed her, and was off to take the night
train for Mercer, which made it possible for him to catch the morning
stage for Old Chester.

There was one other passenger in the stage--a little boy with a soft
thatch of straight, yellow hair that had been chopped short around the
bowl of some domestic barber. He sat on the opposite seat and held a
bundle in his arms, peering out over the top of it with serious blue
eyes.

"Well, young man, where are you bound?" inquired Mr. Pryor. When the
child said "Old Chester," Lloyd Pryor tossed a quarter out of the
window to a hostler and bade him go into the stage-house and buy an
apple. "Here, youngster," he said, when the man handed it up to him,
"take that.--Keep the change, my man."

When it did not involve any personal inconvenience, Mr. Lloyd Pryor
had a quick and cordial kindliness which most people found very
attractive. The child, however, did not seem much impressed; he took
the apple gravely, and said, "Thank you, sir;" but he was not
effusive. He looked out of the window and hugged his bundle. Half-way
to Old Chester he began to nibble the apple, biting it very slowly, so